Two years after the court struck down the right to abortion as a national guarantee, the ruling represents a significant victory for pro-choice advocates.
The plaintiffs were a group of doctors and activists who opposed abortion, and the justices ruled that they lacked standing to file a lawsuit.
One of the two medications used in a medication abortion—which is currently the most popular way to end pregnancies in the US—is mifepristone.
The Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine and the plaintiffs had maintained that the drug’s government approval ought to be revoked.
However, several of the court’s seven justices appeared doubtful during the case’s March arguments that any of the plaintiffs had suffered harm as a result of mifepristone’s availability, which is required in order to have the legal standing to suit.
The court stated in their conclusion that although the plaintiffs “had sincere legal, moral, and ideological objections to elective abortion and to FDA’s relaxed regulation,” “they failed to demonstrate” any real harm.
In June 2022, the Supreme Court reversed Roe v. Wade, thereby eliminating the federal right to an abortion. Since then, abortion rights have been restricted in 21 states, surpassing the threshold it established. Out of those, seventeen have declined the treatment at six weeks or less.
